CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. (Sept. 13, 2009) -Competing against some of the top ranked programs in all the nation the ETSU men's tennis team closed out the eighth annual UVA Fall Classic with four ITA ranked wins at the Synder Tennis Center in Charlottesville, Va.

"After a long three days of tennis I'm proud of the guys and how our team is shaping up," said head coach Yaser Zaatini. "We played some of the best teams in the country and I thought it was impressive to come out of this weekend with four ranked wins."

With 12 ranked singles players and three ranked doubles teams in this past weekend's field, ETSU picked up victories against No. 78 Mihai Nichifor of Columbia, No. 93 Ivan Salec of Radford, No. 74 Steven Forman of WakeForest and the No. 48-ranked Elon doubles team of Nemec and Helpingstine.

"There are hundreds of Division I teams that play men's tennis and each roster features anywhere between eight and 10 guys," said Zaatini. "So to put that in perspective, for our guys to beat four top-100 players or better during an opening weekend, it really showed the drive and talent we played with."

Meanwhile, the ETSU duo of Teraz and Bottoni picked up its second doubles win of the weekend defeating Davidson's Gee and Schafer, 9-8 in the Flight A1 third place match.

"Overall, I'm please with the effort we had today," said Zaatini. "We still have a way to go with our conditioning, but against some top-level players in this event, I thought our guys showed some mental toughness and grit that allowed our young team to be successful during this opening tournament."

The championship Bucs return to action next weekend as they try to defend former ETSU legend Enrique Olivares 2008 singles title at the prestigious Southern Intercollegiate, hosted by the University of Georgia, in Athens, Ga.

For more information on the ETSU men's tennis team, please visit www.ETSUBucs.com.